Price comparison sites want to push more expensive tariffs to get paid commission

By Daniel Jones, Consumer Editor

5th April 2017, 2:47 am

Updated: 5th April 2017, 9:59 am

BRITS will lose up to £167million a year if energy price comparison sites hide the cheapest deals.

Sites want to push more expensive tariffs to get paid commission.

PA:Press Association

Current rules set by the energy watchdog Ofgem state that all deals must be shown up front

Getty Images

Consumer groups argue that price comparisons sites should show all deals to make it fairer to the consumer

Current rules set by the energy watchdog Ofgem state that all deals must be shown up front. But, under pressure from the sites, ­regulator the Competition and Markets Authority has said it may allow them to hide deals.

Critics including consumer groups like Citizens Advice argue that price comparison sites should act fairly and show all deals whether or not they receive a commission for them or not.

The Sun exposed how the UK’s biggest energy comparison site uSwitch has been breaching the rule by initially hiding the cheapest deals from customers.

Alamy

uSwitch has been accused of initially hiding the cheapest deals from customers

Instead it has been pushing deals for which it gets commission. These are on average £70 dearer than the cheapest tariffs on the market.

Together that adds up to £167million a year based on the 2.5million switches a year done on energy price comparison sites.

Ed Molyneux of The Big Deal: 'hiding the cheapest deals to boost profits is not acceptable'

Ed Molyneux of consumer campaign The Big Deal said: “The true cost of hiding the cheapest deals from families has finally been revealed. £167million is simply staggering. Hiding the cheapest deals to boost profits is not acceptable.”

How The Sun's People Power campaign is helping readers save big

CASH-CONSCIOUS Hamid Ali and his family are saving £300 a year on bills with The Sun’s People Power campaign, despite having already switched energy several times before.

“There is a huge difference in what we’re paying and we’re still using the same amount of energy, so it’s been a good saving,” Hamid said.

The canny father-of-two says: “I always keep an eye on my bills. The last thing you want is for them to increase the rate, so I do keep checking them.

A print worker at a major publishing plant, Hamid, 39, his wife Humera, 38, and children Harris, 11 and Hannah, 10, share a three-bedroom, semi-detached home in Harlow, Essex.

Hamid says: “Previously I was on £1,100 with up to £200 of extra payments on top and now we’re paying £960 a year.”

The extra cash would go towards paying for petrol, food shopping and will mean living more easily without having to calculate if you can afford it,” he said. However the family are also hoping that they may find the extra money to take a family holiday to Morocco in future.

How to switch

The Sun’s People Power campaign to save you £££s on your gas and electricity ends Friday April 7 at midnight.

Thanks to the people power of thousands of Sun readers bargaining together we created an exclusive energy deal with Green Star Energy that will save the average family £238.

There are other cheaper deals on the market - we will also show you those.

An incredible 21,000 Sun readers have already switched with our people power campaigns saving an incredible £5.7m in total and £275 each.